Ask Lemmy

Does collaborative writing for fun count as games? The communities involved call them games, but there's no thoughts about control schemes or graphics, and no need to do anything outside your browser. That, chat, social media, reading (both for work and personal time), and the like take up the bulk of my PC time.

I use mine mostly for work. But also games, music, and movies.

I think, here on Lemmy, there's relatively many folks who use their computers for other things, given there's so many techies here...

My job is coding so my primary use is doing that stuff. I do game an awful lot though.

I know you said you’re not into games much anymore but If you’re into D&D you might like Baldur’s Gate 3. I also know of a group for older gamers if you’re ever thinking of dabbling again.

Programming, research and education would be my primary computer uses.

I mostly use my computer for:

• CAD (both 3D modeling and circuit board design)
• Programming (mostly embedded firmware in Rust lately)
• Chatting because doing that on a phone is too slow and autocorrect sucks.
• Work (remote desktop, mostly)
• News
• AI tomfoolery with stuff like Stable Diffusion and LLMs.

Every now and again I'll get addicted to a new game and use my PC for that too. My latest addiction was Baldur's Gate 3 when it came out 🤷

I pretty much stopped gaming when I started working serious jobs after college. I was a designer and front end dev, then design lead for a startup (where I allowed myself to be overworked, especially around deadlines). It’s a lot of screen time and playing games when I got home lost it’s appeal. Plus I’d switched to Macs, and my favorite multiplayer games were being over run by cheating (mid 2000s).

I used to play a ton of games throughout my teenage years but fell off in my 20s. Now in my late 30s I still keep up with gaming news and discussion, but I rarely actually play through games anymore. I go through maybe one a year.

You're right that the discussion has changed, and that's due to a number of factors. Mostly, new games are pretty configurable and will run on pretty much any modern hardware. Long gone are the days where you simply couldn't play something unless you ponied up for a Voodoo 2. Add to that, that PC hardware is a lot more standard now. Gaming enthusiasts dont need to learn a bunch of competing hardware standards to keep up anymore.

And the other side is that with the introduction of microtransactions, keeping an eye on how companies are trying to monetize games is important. AAA games these days have Hollywood movie budgets and if they're not profitable, then hundreds of people are out of a job. Looking back, it's pretty amazing what 10-15 people could accomplish with a fraction of the budget and time that modern developers get(indie games notwithstanding)

I’m in my 40s and I sort of just dropped out of gaming on PC. I game on a console when I feel like I want to game.

My desktop rarely gets turned on anymore and I only use it for a cracked version of Wizards of the Coast’s 4E character builder because I play in a group that runs fourth edition.

My laptop is for learning things (IT related), general browsing, taxes, and whatever I feel like doing that feels cumbersome on a phone.

Xennial here. My non-admin use is probably split 60% learning, 30% programming, 10% gaming

My usage is a roughly even split between games, music, and all other media (including social media).

Programming and other digital projects used to be on par with music but back then games was a clear first place and social media use was a blip.

Yeah. I don't play computer games, and the computer my kid plays games on? She uses it more for drawing. The kids (not little kids) have laptops and use them for school. So about 1/5 of the computer use here is games. Lots of music streaming. One kid has a PS4 though, so there is a lot of gaming overall.

Rarely. I barely have time to game, never mind do the other things like code or whatever. Had my gaming pc for only about a year though

I am an adjunct professor. My evenings are taken for making slides and marking. I wish I had time for gaming.

The primary use of my computer is for work as I am a 3D artist. I also watch a lot of videos and it serves as my audio rig for my music and headphones.

My main computer is a 500$ laptop that I use for writing, bills, shipping, etc. My gaming laptop comes out maybe once a week.

Yeah, I like gaming but lately I don't have the time for it and just like you I've switched to in person tabletop as it has the added benefit of interpersonal interactions face to face.

Anyway answering your question, yes I use it a lot, sometimes more or less depending on my job situation but mostly browsing, illustration, emails and 3D software make about 80% of my computer time.

I mostly use my Mac for business stuff, art and coding. The PC spends most of its time on offloaded AI tasks and rendering jobs. It was originally a toy for gaming but I’d rather use my Steam Deck for that now.

I rarely use my computers for games. Occasional bomb squad game with my wife. That's about it. I use it a lot for watching things, and coding a lot, related to work/personal projects and such. It was weird for me to find out most people that spend a lot of time on computers here are doing it because of games. Not because computers are fun to work with.

I do so many different things on my computers that I rarely have time to play. I do have four or five games (as in Steam bought), but all I get to play is a clondike solitaire occasionally.

I do game, but I have a dedicated HTPC that I game on. My laptop is mostly for work, I own my own business so I do a lot of design, spreadsheeting, etc. I also write lyrics and prose for a hobby, so I use my laptop for that, as well as some light music production. I think the only game I play on it is the KDE minesweeper clone.

I build my machine about 8 years ago and it is time for a new one. I use it mainly for coding and research but I do like the occasional game (even VR). I try to max out specs so the PC lasts a long time.

I mean, I play a lot of games, but the time I spend coding for work and coding for not work is definitely greater time spent gaming.

I last launched Minecraft about 4 years ago. Before that, I don’t even remember what games I might have played on my computer. The last console game I played with any regularity was GTA 5 on console, and once I beat the single player game I pretty much stopped. I simply don’t have time to spend on games I guess. I do have both Cribbage and Sudoku on my phone. Probably play them a combined average of 2-3 hours a month.

https://mastodon.social/@livelakemichigan/ https://mastodon.social/@livelakesuperior/ https://bsky.app/profile/lake-michigan.live https://bsky.app/profile/lake-superior.live

And if you dig hard enough you'll see I'm an app architect closing in on 20 years in the industry.

My partner and I have some high end gaming machines and play games maybe once a week or every other week. Our computers’ main use is downloading movies and shows and playing them for us!

I used to play 40+ hours a week, but that was like a half-decade ago.

Technically for me it's work now

I mostly use mine to program. I started gaming again after barely playing them for a decade, but that is not my computer's primary purpose. Otherwise, I do dumb online browsing, play D&D with friends (used to...), fiddle around with art (mostly do that on iPad), 3d printing or electronics related things. Random shit like that.